"Rules Opinions Sought" Topic

Gentlemen,

I have a hankering to recommence an old foray into late 17th and early 18th century wargaming. I have a 28mm Malburnian Anglo-Dutch army based on a 1/50 figure scale and used to use a home adapted set of Asquith's rules.

Since that time I have played other periods using WAB ancients (I have acquired but not used their ACW set) and use the Grand Manner rules for Napoleonics.

I am after some advice or just opinions on rule sets which reflect the flavour (particularly national characteristics) but are less cumbersome than the abovementioned Grand Manner set (lots of calculations and tables). If a set covers the effect of divergent formations and firing techniques, that would be great. Before leaving it at that, some parameters:

I like the 1/20 troop scale and want to stick with 28mm figures – I can't get past the bigger looking battalions. If a system relies more on elements or bases, rather than figures that's fine if I can cram it to look right. I am not by nature a rules collector – the less sets I have to get my head around the better as I game in many periods. I prefer to go narrow if needs be to get the period right rather than a set which attempts to spread across too great a time scale (and yes, this is contradictory to my previous preference). For me, simple fast play is generally a good thing. I'll be starting with Wars of the Spanish Succession for my period and going backwards with whatever I settle on to the French Dutch wars of the later 17th century.

Thanks in advance for anyone who comes to the rescue.

Piquet Field of Battle---lots of national characteristics and works very well in 18th 19th cent periods--Also as long as both sides are based roughly the same figure numbers etc doesn't matter…I play AWI using it and it works really well..

Well, I was ready to jump in with archstanton and agree about using Field of Battle. It is fast play, flexible and can be tailored to each era and army. However, some of your other comments seem to contradict what you are looking for. I LOVE Field of Battle for anything from about 1700 thru early WWI. Not exactly sure what you are looking for though.

Thanks,

John

Unlucky, I think you are looking for Beneath the Lily Banners:

PDF link

Rich

I agree with Rich, Beneath Lily Banners is an excellent fast play rule set

Neil
scottyswargaming.blogspot.com

If you want to get a "taste" of "Beneath the Lily Banners" before deciding, you might want to visit Angus Konstam's "Edinburgh Wargames" site. There you can download a copy of their "Lillibulero" rules, which Angus describes as "Free rules (but without Barry's shiny production values)".

The site is here:
link

Great "eye candy" on the site!

And the download is here:
link

Scroll to the bottom of the page for the download in a Word document.

Bill
Sir William the Aged
warsoflouisxiv.blogspot.com

For 17th century, I would have to say Beneath the Lilly Banners. Not that fond of the rules themselves personally, but it seems to suit your style of gaming. The great thing I do like, is, because the author is a 28mm gamer, all his pics and units look amazing!

For 18th century I will always go for Koenig Krieg, every time :)

I like Koenigs Krieg for 18th wargaming using 15-mm figures. Though I also like play "Age of Reason" when I game with 28-mm SYW minis.